


Off The Edge of the Map

by writteninhaste



Series: Never Quite Eden [2]
Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Mythology, Gen, Greek Mythology - Freeform, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Mythology - Freeform, european mythology, magical creature!au, young!Aramis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-06
Updated: 2014-04-19
Packaged: 2018-01-18 09:30:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1423378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writteninhaste/pseuds/writteninhaste
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The old maps told of monsters that lay at the edge of the world, waiting to swallow those who fell off the edge. Whoever drew them forgot that there were just as many monsters on land these days.</p><p>Each chapter is a stand alone story - implied/referenced non-con only in chapter 2.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Our Host Decrees No Water Here Tonight (Porthos)

**Author's Note:**

> This chapter deals with implied/referenced non-con. The descriptions are vague and non-graphic, they don't deal with a canon character, but please proceed with caution if this could be a trigger for you.

“Come boy, and pour for me a cup  
Of old Falernian. Fill it up  
With wine, strong, sparkling, bright, and clear;  
Our host decrees no water here.  
Let dullards drink the Nymph's pale brew,  
The sluggish thin their blood with dew.  
For such pale stuff we have no use;  
For us the purple grape's rich juice.  
Begone, ye chilling water sprite;  
Here burning Bacchus rules tonight!”

~ Catullus

* * *

 

Porthos knows that once upon a time, long ago, he was someone else. Before he was the orphaned son of a slave, Porthos thinks he might have been a god. It’s blasphemy. Everyone knows that the heathen gods of old were nothing more than myths. But sometimes, when the drink has lulled him to a restless sleep, Porthos will remember the wild shriek of ecstatic women, the rolling eyes of a stag run to ground and goblets spilling with wine as thick as blood. He should be horrified to dream such things, but Porthos only ever wakes with a smile on his face.

He finds Athos watching him sometimes, watching as though he knows more than he is saying, when the thrill of the chase has left Porthos raucous and laughing. On those nights, Porthos will gamble until he has nothing left to bet but his own blood and skin, and then he will win it all back, laughing like a thing possessed as he parts men from money; drinks like he will never drink again and drags whatever willing woman he can find down into his lap. They are always willing on those nights. Their faces seem vaguely familiar and they whisper to him in forgotten tongues. His laughter and his drunkenness incite the men around him to new violence. Laughing women will tear through the streets, bearing down on unsuspecting men, dragging them along in an endless frantic dance that ends with blood running through the Paris streets and a red dawn on the horizon.

Athos always bears witness on those nights: when blood and wine make Porthos drunk with pleasure, when he forgets himself entirely and can think only of a different, half-remembered life.

In the cold light of day, Porthos is always sick to his stomach. He will vomit onto the cobbles, hands braced against rough brick, and blood-dark wine, undigested, will spill from between his lips.

Aramis never sees him like this. For some reason he is always absent, as though he can scent the change in the wind and has no desire to see what the coming storm will bring. On those nights Porthos knows his friend buries himself between some lady’s thighs; he will stumble into the garrison the morning after looking wrung out and shocked, skin scored by nails and teeth, but he will be whole and well and he will not have been dragged into some wine-soaked hunt that leaves men mad or dying.

Most of the time though, Porthos is simply Porthos. Aramis stands beside him smiling, and Athos lends them his laconic wit. He is a man in a world where being human is nothing more than a matter of chance; there is nothing special about Porthos.

Except on those nights when the Maenads run through the Paris streets, calling for their lost lord to join them in their revelry.

**Fin.**


	2. Sins of the Father

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "For the sins of your fathers you, though guiltless, must suffer." ~ Horace

Aramis was sorry that archery had gone out of style. Even as a child his fingers had itched for bow and string. His grandfather, on his mother’s side, had kept an ancient crossbow in the hayloft – a relic hoarded by generations. The wood had rotted through in places and the string had all but perished but one of Aramis’ earliest memories was sitting amongst the hay in the warm spring sunlight, letting his hands run over every inch of it.

With the poor skills of a child, he had fashioned for himself a little toy bow – useless for anything other than make-believe – with a creeping vine in the place of a string and reeds taken from the river’s edge to act as his arrows. His mother had smacked his hands away when she found him playing at being a Crusader, slaying the Saracens with his great aim. She had broken the bow across her knee and dragged him back to the village howling and crying. She pushed him into his grandfather’s arms and safe in the old man’s embrace, Aramis had realised that she was crying too – soft, desperate tears as she begged her father to teach her boy to shoot. A weapon she said, any weapon you can lay your hands on. Just don’t give him a bow.

His grandfather had done as requested, face tight and pinched with worry as he wrapped Aramis’ hands around the butt of a pistol. Aramis had proved himself a crack shot; his aim unnervingly accurate even at such a young and untried age. The cool glide of metal never felt as right as the warm weight of wood, but the thrill of the shot chased away any lingering discomfort. From that day on, firearms became Aramis’ greatest friend. 

The old bow in the hayloft was quietly taken away and destroyed and his mother would hear no word of archery beneath her roof. It wasn’t until Aramis met his father for the first time, that he understood why.

Cyrek would have been a giant of a man, had he been human. As it was, at fourteen, the top of Aramis’ head barely reached the crest of the centaur’s hip. Hooves the size of his mother’s best plates stamped at the ground and Aramis felt his eyes unwillingly trailing down naked skin until they reached the seamless line where man became horseflesh. When he looked back up, hard, grey eyes were staring at him. Aramis flinched back and then corrected himself, chin lifting in defiance. He was highly conscious of the fact that one blow from those hooves and his ribcage would crumble like dead leaves.

Cyrek snorted, moving to a light trot as he circled Aramis, inspecting him. His left hand clutched a short, curving bow and Aramis’ eyes followed the gleam of sunlight on the well-worn wood. 

“So,” Cyrek said at last, “you are my son.” 

Aramis gave no answer.

“Small,” Cyrek continued at length, “and human, which is a disappointment. Still, your mother was strong enough to survive your siring; I might yet get a foal from her, for all she has advanced in years.”

Aramis felt white hot fury lance up his spine. His fingers twitched toward the knife strapped to his waist. “Touch her, and I’ll kill you.” 

Cyrek laughed. “Such spirit. Yes, you are one of mine. We share the same fire, boy; you live for the chase, as much as I.”

Shame curled hot and tight in Aramis’ chest. He thrilled in the chase – the smile, the gaze, the minute gestures that could tip the scale from dismissal to interest. Aramis would take his pleasure where he could find it – would collect kisses like trinkets and discard them just as easily. Looking up at the monster that had sired him, Aramis prayed for that to be where the resemblance ended. 

Cyrek snorted and stamped the ground, impatient. It would seem he grew weary of his son’s staring. His eyes drifted over the crest of the hill, away from the small copse of trees where they were standing, to the curl of smoke rising from the village fires. 

Aramis thought of his mother: her worn hands tending to the pot on the hearth, perhaps, or bent over her mending, cloth spilling from her lap. He thought of her small fingers, snapping his toy bow like a twig and the fine trembling that had shaken all her limbs whenever anyone questioned the whereabouts of her boy’s father.

Aramis resettled his grip upon his knife and between one breathe and the next drove it into his father’s gut. Warm, wet blood rushed across his hands and Cyrek gave a grunt of surprise, head twisting to look round and down, startled, even as his hands clutched his belly. Aramis gave a desperate heave and wrenched the blade down and to the side, slitting the intestines. Cyrek gave a garbled yell and one of his forelegs struck Aramis in the stomach. The blow lifted the boy from his feet, sending him sprawling amidst the leave and grass. Cyrek made to leap after him, but the blood was still pouring thick and fast and he stumbled with his first step. 

He fell to the ground, hard. His legs gave out from beneath him and he snarled, one last defiant breathe before pink spittle began to foam about his lips and he fell twitching to the grass, writhing in his final death throes. His fingers clutched at his bow the entire time.

Aramis rolled to his knees. His side felt as though it were on fire and the aching grind of bone against bone told him he had broken several ribs. With an effort, Aramis staggered to his feet and stumbled over to the centaur’s body. With an angry cry, he stamped down hard on the glossy wood of the bow, and once he began, he could not stop. He screamed and cried and trampled the weapon into kindling. He continued to pound his feet until the splinters had begun to turn to dust and his chest and side were one giant, stabbing ache. 

That was how they found him. Bruised and broken, lying next to a cooling corpse, the broken remnants of a bow scattered between him. The men of the village carried him back. His mother bound his ribs and held him as he cried like a child. He swore to his mother, then, that he would forsake the chase. He would be different, he would be better – for her sake he would not be a monster. 

She had wrapped his face, in cracked and weathered hands, and kissed his brow. “The chase is your blood child, there is no escaping that, no matter how you try. But I will be content if you promise me, you will only ever capture willing prey.”

Aramis gripped her hands in his and held them tight. “I swear, Mother. I swear: no one who is not willing.”

His mother pulled her hands away and regarded him with tired eyes. “We shall see,” she said, “we shall see.”

**Fin.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: Athos


	3. The World's More Full Of Weeping

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was Thomas – good Thomas, wise Thomas – who asked the questions that needed answers. Thomas who saw the danger, Athos was too blind to see.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Come away, O human child!  
> To the waters and the wild  
> With a faery, hand in hand,  
> For the world's more full of weeping  
> than you can understand.”  
> ― W.B. Yeats,

It was Thomas – good Thomas, wise Thomas – who asked the questions that needed answers. Thomas who saw the danger Athos was too blind to see.  Athos was prepared to follow her anywhere. _I swear_ he had said, and meant it. _Til death do us part._ Nothing, save for Death, would ever come between them.

She had other ideas.

Perhaps it was the sickness that frightened her: the fever that spread through the countryside like wildfire. Athos succumbed – lay coughing in his sickbed, weakly, as she mopped his brow, and sang to him sweet lullabies. The fair folk do not know disease – they do not know the dry, skin-cracking heat of sickness, or the sharp-sweet stench of vomit and bile. She must have been terrified, to see him lying there. She had sworn to him a vow of eternal devotion, as he had sworn one to her in return. Perhaps she had not realised until that moment, how very short a lifetime could be for mortal men.

It had been a quick recovery. Athos was young and strong – well-fed and with doctors to attend him. A week, then two, and he was riding once again, surveying La Fere with Anne not half a step behind him. She would barely let him out of her sight in those months after the sickness. She would wrap herself in his arms at night, and Athos would listen to her breathing: the soft gust of murmured prayers in her people’s tongue and her fingers tracing marks of protection on his skin. She grew thin and wan with fear for him, and Athos could sense a kind of desperation building between them.

Their couplings became more frantic. She would bear him down and ride him, nails scoring marks across his chest, lips bitten to bleeding. She would not stop until he flipped them, pressed her down into the bedding and stayed beside her, inside her, until he was soft and oversensitive, and she had calmed enough to release him.

His heart was breaking for her: his Fairy Bride, who had left all she’d known behind to be his wife. He brought her flowers, gathered from the garden, he brought her jewels and trinkets and took her riding in the meadows. He tried to prove to her again and again that he was alive. That he would remain alive – that she had nothing to fear. But still she watched him with her hollow eyes, and whispered prayers for his longevity.

And so he asked her, what gift, what oath could he provide that would ease her suffering.

And so she told him.

“Come with me, into the Timeless Kingdom.” She said. “Come with me into that happy place, where there is no pain or sorrow. Any wish you make comes true and you will never age.”

How could he deny her? He loved her: loved her with every beat of his heart, with every breath. He had sworn that nothing would ever come between them, and now, nothing ever would.

Thomas would care for la Fère. He was well-loved, and he was clever. He would be a good landlord and a good master. In time he would be a husband and a father, and eventually the people would forget that there had ever been an older heir. Olivier d’Athos would be nothing but a dimming memory. Thomas would be Le Comte de la Fère.

They waited until the May Day dawn, when the people of la Fère were all gathered in the Church to hear the Marion mass. Thomas would be there. Ever since their mother's death he had attended the May mass to ask for the Virgin’s intercession for her soul. Athos did not have his brother’s faith.

While the church bells rang to start the service, Athos left his signet ring and a copy of his will on his writing desk. Anne was with the horses. She was waiting for him.

The mist was still curling across the ground as Athos made his way to the stables. The air was cool, the ground still crisp before the midday heat. Athos tugged his gloves over his wrist and rounded the corner of the stables in time to see Anne slide a silver blade between his brother’s ribs.

Athos felt as though the world had slipped. As Thomas fell, so did he – two men down on their knees against the hard, packed earth. His lungs could not draw breath and as Thomas’ body slid sideways to the ground, Athos felt a great weight settle on his limbs. His brother’s eyes were staring – accusing – cursing Athos for bringing this creature into their home. The knife Anne held was still dripping blood – thick and red and falling like raindrops. Her eyes were cold and still; she was so beautiful. Athos felt nausea overwhelm him.

“You killed him.” Athos’ voice sounded strange in his own ears. “Why?”

“He wanted to keep you here. You belong with me.”

“He was my brother.”

Thomas was still staring. His tongue had slipped from his open lips and lay fat and heavy against his cheek. Blood had spread dark and wet against the leather of his jacket.

There was the hurried tramp of footsteps and Athos would wonder later if he had yelled or screamed. His ostler and the blacksmith had come running. Anne was still standing with the knife. Remi raised his hand, clutching cold iron, and she let the knife slip from her fingertips.

Later, Athos would not be able to remember giving the order for the arrest; would not remember how she had let her hands be bound and let herself be led to her chambers. He would remember only how he had gathered Thomas in his arms; how he had closed his brother’s eyes and wept like a child.

He ordered her to be hung from the tree the next day. Whilst the undertakers prepared the grave, Athos followed the priest out to the tree. She would hang, until the strength of the noonday sun wrinkled her flesh like withered fruit, until she was nothing but a husk, a shell – left to dangle in the summer breeze. She had warned him, when they first met, never to open the curtains when the sun was at its zenith. She would lie upon their bed – a creature of mist and moon and twilight – and shrink from the power of the sun outside. A maid, unthinking, had flung back the curtains once; Anne had dived to safety beneath their bed, but the woman in question had been whipped for her carelessness. Thomas had objected, even then.

Athos should have listened.

 

**Fin.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up - three becomes four.


End file.
